The present invention relates to the field of imaging and biopsy, and more particularly without limitations, to the field of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) of breast lesions and breast biopsy.
Prior art techniques for imaging and identifying the location of the breast lesions involves the introduction of a contrast agent that, due to the differences between the normal breast tissue and lesion tissue, can enable the detections of the lesion tissue under MRI. Systems can be utilized that incorporate fiducial markers, which can also appear in the MRI image. The fiducial markers can be positioned on a biopsy device such that the location of the lesion tissue relative to the biopsy device can be determined from a diagnostic MRI image taken of the breast held in a biopsy device. Positioning of a biopsy needle relative to the lesion tissue can then be accomplished by positioning the needle with respect to the biopsy device, where the position of the biopsy device relative to the lesion tissue is known from the diagnostic image.
Prior art techniques involve manually calculating the position of the lesion relative to the biopsy device, based on the knowledge of the fiducial markers in the MRI image showing the lesion, in order to assist in locating a needle to take a biopsy of the lesion. After such calculation, the biopsy needle is inserted to the lesion provided by the manual calculations in order to position the biopsy needle in position with respect to the lesion tissue. The desired position of the biopsy needle can allow determination of a point of entry into the tissue, an angle of entry into the tissue, and a depth of entry into the tissue. Once the biopsy needle is inserted, another MRI image can be taken to confirm the accuracy of the placement of the biopsy needle.
However, the process of manually calculating the position of the lesion, based on the knowledge of the fiducial markers in the MRI image showing the lesion, is time-consuming. Due to the time needed to manually calculate the location of the lesion, based on the relative position of the lesion with respect to the fiducial markers in the diagnostic MRI image, typically the contrast agent no longer allows identification of the lesion tissue by the time the interventional MRI image is taken to confirm the location of the biopsy needle. Therefore, the accuracy of the biopsy needle placement depends on the accuracy of the manual calculations based on the relative position of the lesion with respect to the fiducial marks in the diagnostic image. Due to the movement of the breast with respect to the biopsy device, during the period of time between taking the original diagnostic MRI image to image the lesion and taking the latter interventional MRI image confirming the location of the biopsy needle, the relative position of the lesion tissue with respect to the fiducial markers and, therefore, the relative position of the lesion tissue with respect to the biopsy device in the interventional MRI image is not known with great accuracy. In particular, factors such as inaccuracies of the manual calculations and movement of the breast with respect to the fiducial marker can negatively impact the accuracy of the positioning of the biopsy needle relative to the lesion tissue.
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art for a system and method that can allow more accurate placement of the biopsy needle relative to lesion tissue. Additionally, there is a need in the art for a system and method that can allow placement of the biopsy needle while the contrast agent still allows identification of the lesion tissue during the taking of the interventional MRI image. In this way, a more accurate placement of the biopsy needle relative to the lesion tissue can be achieved.